[Kimmitmelvirm]

To me, cessation of suffering means that you know which actions and choices will cause suffering, so you try to make choices that will not cause unnecessary suffering. It does not mean that you cannot suffer.

I like very much your interpretation.

Cessation of suffering actually makes you free. Using your analogy, if you just float downstream, you will have no choice over your life. Once you are enlightened, you will be able to hover on top of the stream, and go anywhere you wish, up the stream, down the stream or leave the stream and go to the forest instead.

But these are desires. The desire to be free. The desire to be enlightened. Doesn't Buddhism teach that one should free oneself from desire? Why desire to do anything? Why desire to eat? To drink water? To live? Why desire good? Surely to desire good would lead to suffering.


How is this state of mind any sort of improvement over one in which (good) desire serves as a motivator? Sure, there may be some suffering if one desires the well-being of others, but along with suffering comes the opposite as well. Why should I not simply accept this? Won't the inevitable suffering pass? Is the inevitable suffering not worth it? What's really important? Is it to rid myself of attachment and the resulting suffering that is experienced?

These are the kinds of questions I'm asking myself.

Hi Nathan, I offer another observation from my experience. I have found that the moments of peace which I experience from practice lead me to continue with practice with confidence of the outcome.

But in practicing Buddhism, should you not dissolve attachment towards the outcome that you wish you achieve? Even with confidence in the outcome, upon dissolving desire for the outcome, why would one continue to practice? Is practicing not in pursuit of a desire? What happens when you realize that it is a desire and then let the desire go?